The Paarsen Family
Today I was racing as I actually had to be somewhere at a particular time. Peter and Annemieke where in San Francisco and the plan was to meet up with them there. I did my usual Philly calculations on distances and reckoned I would be there at about 3pm. Well we all now how accurate and good my distance and timing calculations are. I hit the road highway 101 a great 2 lane highway with long sweeping bends through gorgeous scenery I was making excellent progress. Only fly in the ointments was a motorcycle crash some poor old fellow on a huge Goldwing and trailer seemingly his side stand had come down and dug in and thrown him of his bike. He was on his knees and moving and the crash scene seemed well organised so I did not get to involved and I continued with my journey.
This was a bit of a wakeup call on the vulnerability of motorcycles but as we motorcyclist do I had rationalised this and had soon forgot and was hammering along just as before. This reminded me of a time when I was racing and there was huge crash at Zandvoort Race Circuit and we were all waiting for the track to be cleared so we could get out and race. It took a while as the trauma helicopter was called out the guy was seriously injured. Well we waited and then the track was clear and what did we do next we all went racing. Next meeting we heard the poor chap had died we had a minute’s silence and what did we next we zipped up our leathers and went racing no one that I recall wanted to talk about the accident we just got on with doing what we love and that is motorcycling so that is what I mean about a rationalising this you think about it for a short while and then you get your head down and then you are lost in that wonderful world of motorcycling.
Pacific Highway Nr1
Well it got better I turned on to Pacific highway number one the road narrowed and then started to twist and turn and this went on for the rest day. Slow 10 and 15 mph corners according to the signs sometimes they where about right others I may have been going a tad faster. So I really earned my money today beautiful scenery on the coast hanging on the edge and then inland all in all a top day for riding but unfortunately was racing against the clock to get to San Francisco to meet my Dutch friends. I had jokingly said to Peter on Skype that I would find a McDonald’s with free Wi-Fi and call them to tell where I was and where to meet but on this stretch of road no McDonald’s in fact very little in the way of fuel and fast food chains very un-American in fact. I finally found a pay phone and rang Peter with a new revised ETA and continued to enjoy this glorious ride.
I got to their Motel at about 7pm so only 3 hours out on my original estimate! Hard driving all the way so I am knackered. First thing we did was jump in their van to see if we could catch the sun set but this being San Francisco the clouds had moved so not much of sun set and the wind was really blowing me and the Paarsen clan mucked around on the Golden Gate Bridge viewing area for a while and then headed back to the motel for some supper.
Golden Gate Bridge
It was a quite night just chatting it was 2 months since I had spoken any Dutch so that was a bit rusty but it was good to see some familiar people. I ended up setting up camp in their cupboard for the night good to be fed and looked after so well after a long hard day in the saddle I could get used to this unfortunately they are heading North and I am heading South but it was great to see you guys veel lol met de rest van jullie vakantie en bedankt nogmaals voor jullie gastvrijheid
My Cupboard 🙂
Phillys Big Trip 